How Big Is Your Spaghetti Pot?

When I make spaghetti, I make spaghetti! I remember having a friend many years ago who would make spaghetti for each time she had it. I told her how my mother always made it by the batch. My friend figured it took her only a few minutes to make the recipe, so there was no need to do more than one batch at a time.

I am sharing this information with you because I want you to know that *anytime* you can make a batch of anything for the freezer you are saving yourself so much time. Think about it.

When you are going to make a dinner of spaghetti sauce you are going to get out the ingredients - 5 minutes, brown the meat and onions - 10 minutes, open the cans - 5 minutes, compile the ingredients and add the spices - 10 minutes, clean up your mess - 10 minutes. Total: 40 minutes.

When I make a batch up spaghetti and that includes one for that evening, plus three or four for the freezer it takes me: about 60 minutes to do it all. I simply brown more ground beef and open more cans. But I still have to only compile the recipe and clean the kitchen one time.

When my family was smaller I would make the same size batch as I do now, but at that time it stretched further, so I could easily put 8-10 batches of sauce in the freezer!! Do the math - that would save me 10 recipes x 40 minutes= 400 minutes. Instead I would spend 60 minutes.

Now that might not sound that astounding, but imagine if you have other recipes that could be put in the freezer? What about Sloppy Joe sauce? Or Chicken and Sauce recipes? When I had more small children and less older helpers I used to live on my freezer sauces and recipes. Now that I have older children to help with the cooking I can rely on less freezer and more fresh. So if you are a mum who has limited time, but you don't want to do a lot of freezer meals, you could simply do the spaghetti sauce, because that is a really easy to one to put away!

And think what you could do with the time you are not cooking? Relax, go for a walk, read to your children, blog, read a book, work on a craft. All in one hour a day!

Preparing the Sauce

A Full Batch of Sauce

Freezer Batch Spaghetti Sauce

6lb ground beef
2 medium onions, chopped

1 green pepper, chopped
1 red pepper, chopped
3 stalks celery, chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced

2 - 10 oz cans mushrooms
2 - 28 oz cans diced tomatoes
2 large pasta sauce cans (Heinz 2.84 litres each)
1 can 680 mls pasta sauce
2-3 cups water (enough to wash out pasta cans)
2 Tbsp oregano
2 Tbsp basil
3 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce
1/4 cup sugar

1) Brown ground beef and onions. Pour into a huge cooking pan. (at least 12" tall)

2) In a couple tablespoons of olive oil, lighty saute the green and red peppers, celery, and garlic.

3) Add the green and red peppers, celery, and garlic to the browned ground beef.

4) Add the mushrooms, diced tomatoes, pasta sauce, water, spices, Worcestershire sauce, and sugar. Mix well.

5) Bring to a high heat - do NOT burn - then turn down to very low and let simmer quietly for a few hours. Stir occasionally. Cool and then freeze in family size portions.

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